IMF managing director arrested, accused of sexual attack

[blanc]

"Let's have a toast for the douchebags..."
Thanks Jack R. I was wondering how to work in a quip about douchebags running out of the douche to commit douchebaggery. All done already.

[Peachtree Pam]

Here is an article written by a Frenchwoman for the Guardian which for me illustrates the difficulty the French - whether men or women - have in even imagining and admitting that a man of DSK's position could be a rapist. In the end, she equates rape with imprisonment in a weak effort to explain her "sympathy" for him.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree ... kahn/print

Dominique Strauss-Kahn and the game only one side plays



As French reaction to the Strauss-Kahn affair shows, many powerful men think their 'flirting' is harmless
by Virginie Despentes


Marine Le Pen was finally bumped from French TV last week, to make way for a special on Dominique Strauss-Kahn (DSK). For once, France was discussing something other than Islam.

The men speak first – the female guests will have to wait their turn, naturally – they are debating as editors of national newspapers, and no women have those jobs. In France, between the banking and nuclear crises, police violence, the decline of schools, the collapse of the health system and numerous political scandals, there should always be enough to get angry about. And yet the panel guests are usually very calm. Not this time, though.

This has nothing to do with a sudden and brutal feminist realisation. What enrages the guests are the attacks from the US and British press. French journalists have the thickest of skins. But once the cameras turned on them, they rediscovered a healthy indignation. They are doing their job fine, they say; they just have a journalistic ethic that work stops where the bedroom begins.

Laurent Joffrin of the Nouvel Observateur keeps opening his great gob, despite having just published the name and address of DSK's alleged victim (there's an important piece of information to disseminate). As for Franz Olivier Giesbert, from L'Express, he thinks "the left has lost the moral battle". Whatever the outcome of DSK's trial, it is hard to see why François Hollande or Martine Aubry would be tainted by the scandal, unless they were hiding in the room. If you're going to lump everyone together, it's members of the male sex who have just lost the moral battle. I don't find that kind of generalisation displeasing, but I'd be astonished to hear it coming from a man.

And then David Pujadas, the host, comes up with this: "We talk about harassment, not heavy flirting – surely there's a difference." Oh. And what is this subtle yet crucial nuance? There: "heavy flirting" doesn't matter. In the workplace, in the street, in a nightclub – it's tolerable. Except, why would it be something that anyone should have to endure? Does Pujadas get heavily flirted with in his job? Does he come home feeling vaguely nauseated by someone else's desires? Does he sweep sexist jokes under the carpet? What does he know of the lose-lose strategy an unwanted proposal brings: when saying yes means forthcoming retaliation, and saying no means retaliation too. He is a straight man in a world run by straight men and has not the faintest idea of the obstacles "flirting" throws up, and even less of the trouble it can cause.

Finally, he lets one of the women, a political journalist, speak. And only then we finally hear how "heavy flirting" is current practice in political circles. Yet she chooses her words oh so carefully, because the last thing she would want is for people to think she resents men. But, nevertheless, she says the words: "It can make us feel very uncomfortable."

I understand what she's talking about: when you look at the men who run the country, the mere idea that they consider anything genital-based gives you nightmares. Meanwhile, I would like to know exactly how things work out for those female temptresses. Is it, by chance, no problem? Maybe after falling from grace their careers just carry on? This idea that "seduction" is just a friendly French practice couldn't, for example, explain why the national assembly is almost exclusively male? Or the council of ministers? And all the editors of major newspapers?

Over the last few days, everyone has seemed to agree that mixing sex and officialdom is harmless; but I'd like to see the list of women who benefit, because at the moment I feel the game is only fun for one of the two parties involved. All I get is that women in politics must put up with a deeply humiliating, sexist atmosphere, while the men's misconnected neurons makes them think they are Don Juans. If only it were only DSK; but it is clear that the damage goes far wider.

Getting back to the New York bathroom, I – like everyone – have no idea what happened. But from the moment DSK appeared handcuffed and flanked by cops, sent to jail under the cameras, he became a sympathetic character. Which he never was to me before. Because if anything is as disgusting and incomprehensible as rape, it's prison: this rape by the state, this abject, useless destruction of humanity.

What does prison create? It is no solution, just the face of inhumanity, the dirty mirror reflecting how poorly we live together, how we only know how to respond to violence by unleashing more violence. No practice whose purpose is to demolish the individual, to strip him bare and break him, deserves any sympathy. Whether it is called rape or jail, we need to ask ourselves how we developed the sordid habit of considering either one as part of the landscape, or as tolerable.

[DoYouEverWonder]

Getting back to the New York bathroom, I – like everyone – have no idea what happened. But from the moment DSK appeared handcuffed and flanked by cops, sent to jail under the cameras, he became a sympathetic character. Which he never was to me before. Because if anything is as disgusting and incomprehensible as rape, it's prison: this rape by the state, this abject, useless destruction of humanity.

What does prison create? It is no solution, just the face of inhumanity, the dirty mirror reflecting how poorly we live together, how we only know how to respond to violence by unleashing more violence. No practice whose purpose is to demolish the individual, to strip him bare and break him, deserves any sympathy. Whether it is called rape or jail, we need to ask ourselves how we developed the sordid habit of considering either one as part of the landscape, or as tolerable.

How come this humanitarian never wrote something like this about Gitmo or any other gulag? It's only a problem when one their own gets put in one.

[Canadian_watcher]

Getting back to the New York bathroom, I – like everyone – have no idea what happened. But from the moment DSK appeared handcuffed and flanked by cops, sent to jail under the cameras, he became a sympathetic character. Which he never was to me before. Because if anything is as disgusting and incomprehensible as rape, it's prison: this rape by the state, this abject, useless destruction of humanity.

What does prison create? It is no solution, just the face of inhumanity, the dirty mirror reflecting how poorly we live together, how we only know how to respond to violence by unleashing more violence. No practice whose purpose is to demolish the individual, to strip him bare and break him, deserves any sympathy. Whether it is called rape or jail, we need to ask ourselves how we developed the sordid habit of considering either one as part of the landscape, or as tolerable.

How come this humanitarian never wrote something like this about Gitmo or any other gulag? It's only a problem when one their own gets put in one.

excellent point

[Peachtree Pam]

Here are the French feminists fighting their corner and that of the maid; from the Independent.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world ... 87820.html


Feminists' anger at chauvinism of Strauss-Kahn affair

By John Lichfield in Paris

Monday, 23 May 2011


French feminist groups demonstrated yesterday against what they said is a "flood" of male chauvinist comments generated in France by the Dominique Strauss-Kahn (DSK) affair.

Three women's pressure groups held a protest vigil in Paris and published a 6,000 signature petition condemning the "unabashed sexism" of some politicians and commentators – especially on the Left – who sprang to the defence of the former IMF chief and Socialist presidential contender.

"We do not know what happened in New York on Saturday May 14, but we know what has been happening in France in the past week," the petition said. "We have been disgusted by a daily outpouring of misogynist comments by public figures."

The petition said that friends and allies of DSK had portrayed him as the victim of a judicial lynching or possible conspiracy, ignoring the alleged suffering of the 32-year-old chamber maid whom he is accused of attempting to rape in his Manhattan hotel suite. Their comments, the feminist groups said, reflected the "impunity" with which "uninhibited sexism" was often expressed in French public life.

The petition was drawn up by the groups "Osez le feminisme!" (dare to be feminist!), "La Barbe" (the beard) and Paroles de Femmes (women's words). It was signed by female celebrities including the TV presenters Christine Ockrent and Audrey Pulvar, the actress and comedian, Florence Foresti and the writer, Florence Montreynaud.

The pro-DSK comments which have infuriated women's groups have mostly been made by left-wing politicians and commentators who would normally position themselves as supporters of women's rights. Socialist former culture and education minister, Jack Lang, said that DSK should have been given immediate bail since "no one was dead".

The commentator and leftist-nationalist activist, Jean-François Kahn – a close friend of DSK – said the allegations amounted to no more than a "troussage de domestique" (literally, stripping or having casual, forced sex with a servant). Both men have since apologised for their remarks.

Another friend of DSK, the Socialist Euro MP Gilles Savary, suggested that the ex-IMF chief might have been the victim of a "cultural" gulf between France and the US. Mr Strauss-Kahn, he said, was a "libertine" who enjoyed the "pleasures of the flesh" but this was not tolerated in a "puritan America, impregnated with rigorous Protestantism".

Mr Savary has not yet apologised for calling an alleged attempted rape "pleasures of the flesh".

"This kind of language generates an intolerable confusion between sexual freedom and violence towards women," the feminist petition said. "They tend to minimise the gravity of rape and to create a kind of grey area where it becomes more or less acceptable, just some sort of error of judgement.

"A simple message is being sent to victims: 'Don't complain'."

Politicians in President Nicolas Sarkozy's centre-right UMP party have been delighted by the attack on left-wing politicians by feminist groups. They suggest that the Parti Socialiste will now find it hard to pose as a pro-women's rights party in the presidential election next year.

Environment minister, Nathalie Kosciusko-Morizet, broke ranks yesterday and suggested that sexism was a problem not just in the Socialist party but a social problem in France as a whole. "A woman (alleging a sexual attack) always has to fight to be believed," she said. "Unthinking macho attitudes exist in all levels of society. Men are often not aware of it themselves."

Meanwhile, interior minister, Claude Guéant, said that France would be pressing the US to let DSK serve any jail time in France, if convicted.

[lupercal]

excerpt from DSK's farewell e-mail to IMF staff, sent yesterday:

Sent: Sunday, May 22, 2011 6:01 PM

I deny in the strongest possible terms the allegations which I now face; I am confident that the truth will come out and I will be exonerated. In the meantime, I cannot accept that the Fund—and you dear colleagues—should in any way have to share my own personal nightmare. So, I had to go.

When I first met you, (I am picturing us in the atrium), I confess that all I really had was a sense of commitment to the Fund’s founding vision of global economic cooperation. This last phrase has always been more than just a slogan for me: I come from a place painfully aware of the slide from economic damage to political strife to war, destruction, and human misery. But I had only the vaguest ideas about how to go about the task. I thank you, all of you, for having sharpened that vision not just for me, but for the world, and for having given it content.

The Fund’s response to the crisis has been much praised. I don’t want to leave without remembering with you some key milestones. The early case for fiscal stimulus. The support, analytical and otherwise, for the crisis response by the G20 and the world. The introduction of sensible flexibility in lending tools (FCLs, etc). The large deployment of resources—both securing them, and using them, including in Western Europe for the first time in decades. New tools for identifying crisis risks, like the early warning exercise. Stronger engagement with the emerging market countries, especially in Asia, and with the low-income countries, especially in Africa, including with the new zero interest rate loans.

http://business.blogs.cnn.com/2011/05/2 ... -to-staff/

[lupercal]

Yets here's my source:

INTERNATIONAL TRADE UNION CONFEDERATION

ITUC OnLine
084/140411

IMF’s Strauss-Kahn backs ITUC analysis on global threat of unemployment and inequality

there's a clue

[Peachtree Pam]

Here's an even more muddled, strident defense of the "poor treatment" of DSK by his friend, Bernard-Henri Levy in the German paper, Die Zeit:

http://blog.foreignpolicy.com/posts/201 ... s_the_ante

BHL ups the ante

In an interview with German newspaper Die Zeit, Bernard-Henri Lévy continues to defend his buddy Dominique Strauss-Kahn. A translated selection:

Zeit: But Dominique Strauss-Kahn was treated like any other suspect.

BHL: Yes. But he's not like everyone else. When a run-of-the-mill murderer leaves the police station in handcuffs, a firing squad of cameras isn't awaiting him. But when it's Strauss-Kahn, the whole world is watching. To act like you don't see the difference there, that's the real injustice.

Zeit: Contempt for the American justice system seems to be spreading in France.

BHL: This is not a problem of justice, it's a problem of politics. On the one hand, they don't want to show the pictures of the dead Bin Laden so as not to insult Muslims. On the other hand, they present pictures of Strauss-Kahn on a constant loop without bothering to see if that might insult his wife or family.

Zeit: France's media has been discussing Strauss-Kahn's lifestyle for the past two weeks...

BHL: The fields were tilled in advance. Preparatory shots were fired. And now you have the result: the head of the IMF wearing the very corset of guilt that was designed for him.

Zeit: Are we learning anything new about the relationship between power and sex?

BHL: That puritanical nonsense has overtaken western society.

This is so confused as to be really kind of delightful. Yes, just why didn't President Obama realize that allowing the release of the DSK photos would potentially jeopardize national security by angering the Strauss-Kahn household? And if only Americans had the foresight to realize that the history books will record as the "real injustice" their treatment of DSK as a normal human being...

Anyway, I'd suggest resisting the temptation to correct the multiple misjudgments in favor of simply appreciating the floridness of Lévy's imagination. (Is a "corset of guilt" a real garment? Is that why Lévy keeps his shirt unbuttoned to his navel, to show he's not wearing one?) Here's hoping Strauss-Kahn calls BHL in as a character witness.

One person in the comments section referred to his saying his wife was being insulted by commenting that his wife was his prime enabler.

[kenoma]

Something else for Lupercal to ignore:

The Strauss-Kahn scandals we ignore
David Cronin

The press coverage of Dominique Strauss-Kahn’s arrest leaves me ambivalent. Like every other journalist who has written about the matter, I am not qualified to speculate on whether he committed the crime for which he has been charged. Rape is a very serious matter; so is the right to a fair trial.

Instead of rushing to pass judgment before the accused even set foot in court, perhaps the mainstream media should be asking why it generally ignored firm evidence that Strauss-Kahn had done wrong over the past few years. I am referring here to the decisions he took and the work he approved as head of the International Monetary Fund.

Last month, Strauss-Kahn gave a speech in Washington, in which he lamented how “in too many countries, inequality is at record highs”. Arguing that the IMF could not be “indifferent” to issues of wealth distribution, he added: “We are paying more attention to the social dimension in our programmes—protecting social safety nets for the poor and supporting an equitable sharing of the burden.”Analysed properly, there is something obscene about that comment. The global financial crisis was caused by the feckless behaviour of financial wizards – some of whom have continued to trouser extravagant bonuses. Why should the poor have to bear any burden for a problem that the rich created?

A 2010 paper by Unicef, the United Nations children’s fund, illustrated that the “safety nets” of which Strauss-Kahn was so proud were not sufficient to prevent millions from slipping through them. It highlighted how countries such as Angola, Chad and Congo were planning to introduce cutbacks of up to 13% of gross domestic product over the following year, despite how they all had high levels of malnutrition, childhood mortality or HIV infection. Declining oil revenues were partly responsible for the economic woes of Angola and Chad but the paper suggested that IMF pressure was,too, predicting that the cuts will “likely incur potentially irreversible long-term human costs.”

Beyond some cosmetic changes to policy, Strauss-Kahn has continued to sign the same ruinous prescriptions for many economies that his predecessors have signed since the institution was hijacked by acolytes of Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan. A new study by the Centre for Economic and Policy Research in the US concluded that conditions imposed on Jamaica by the IMF in the past few years are almost identical to those imposed in the 1970s and 1980s, including a freeze on public sector wages. One of the most inimical effects of the measures is that Jamaica suffered one of the highest rates of decline in treatment rates for tuberculosis of any country where this disease is prevalent between 1997 and 2006. And while the enrolment rate for Jamaica’s primary schools reached 97% in 1991, it fell to 87% in 2007.
Strauss-Kahn’s professed concern about inequality and “burden sharing” belies the IMF’s stance towards Pakistan. Between 1980 and 2000, the burden of taxes paid by the poorest households in Pakistan rose by 7%. Yet the country’s richest saw their tax levels fall by 15% over the same period. Value-added tax is known to hurt the poor far more than the rich, yet the Fund has been pushing for VAT increases in Pakistan over the past year. The IMF has remained rigid on this point, despite the floods that devastated much of Pakistan in 2010.

Here in Europe, the austerity measures introduced in Latvia and Estonia at the IMF’s behest have pushed their unemployment levels to almost 20%. In Greece, a nominally socialist government has pledged to raise¤15 billion from selling off state-owned resources to pay back debts to the IMF; that is twice the level of privatisation the Greeks promised last year.Portugal is about to tighten the belts worn by its citizens as part of the“fiscal consolidation” strictures of the Fund and by the EU. Ordinary Portuguese are footing the bill for a bail-out of private banks. Portugal has a gross external debt of euro 216 billion but just euro 43 billion of that sum is owed directly by the Lisbon government.

I don’t imagine that Strauss-Kahn’s prison cell has been inundated with “thank you” cards from IMF staff. But the Fund has flourished under his leadership, which – happily for him – has coincided with a global crisis. In April 2009, it was allocated a whopping $750 billion by the Group of 20 (G20) top economies. By selling gold, it has amassed a further $2.8 billion, while the interest payments on its loans are expected to bring it a cool $500 million profit this year.

Strauss-Kahn’s appointment to the IMF was orchestrated by his nemesis Nicolas Sarkozy, who was keen to send a top rival far away from Paris for a few years. No matter how much his fellow Socialists may deny this, the reality is that Strauss-Kahn has been acting as a puppet of the US Treasury and Wall Street, which ultimately control the IMF, since he moved to Washington in 2007. His successor will also be under the Treasury’s tutelage, regardless of who that person may be or what his or her nationality is.

Strauss-Kahn was able to stay at luxury $3,000-a-night hotels, while implementing ruinous policies that keep millions of poor women, men and children subjugated. It is a shame that the mainstream press was so fixated with his thirst for power that the most scandalous consequences of his work went overlooked.

[JackRiddler]

.

BHL is as close to an unerring compass as GWB. If we're on opposite sides of a question, I feel all the more secure.

BHL: Yes. But he's not like everyone else.

"Clearly, this is no ordinary asshole." -- Dona Yrena in "Walker" (1987)

.

[lupercal]

Something else for Lupercal to ignore:

Thanks, but I think I've heard this song before..

[kenoma]

Something else for Lupercal to ignore:

Thanks, but I think I've heard this song before..

Idiot.

[lupercal]

^ Likewise. The article you posted is a stale mishmash of poorly sourced and mainly irrelevant accusations, as DSK has only run the IMF since 2007, along with several outright lies -- where does DSK say "the poor have to bear any burden for a problem that the rich created?" -- in short, idiotic. But I was trying to let you know in a nice way.

[M F Abernathy]

Apparently, there is now physical evidence that something happened...



http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/05/23/s ... auss-kahn/
Sperm on maid’s dress confirmed to be from IMF chief Strauss-Kahn
By Agence France-Presse
Monday, May 23rd, 2011 -- 5:25 pm




DNA samples confirm that traces of sperm found on a maid's dress were from former IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn, according to published reports.

Telegraph reported that the New York Police sent the test results to French authorities on Sunday.

Strauss-Kahn raced against time Monday to find a new home in a city that does not want him after sex crime charges he called a "personal nightmare."

Rejected by one luxury residence because of his newfound notoriety, the French politician under house arrest pending trial must soon leave his temporary abode and is battling to find a place that will accept him.

Charges that he attempted to rape and sexually assault a chambermaid in a New York hotel on May 14 forced him to resign as head of the International Monetary Fund last week and torpedoed his chances of standing in the French presidential election next year.

But Strauss-Kahn again denied the accusations in an email message sent to IMF staff late Sunday in which he expressed "profound sadness" at the way he left his $450,000 a year tax-free post.

"I deny in the strongest possible terms the allegations which I now face; I am confident that the truth will come out and I will be exonerated," he wrote.


"In the meantime, I cannot accept that the Fund --- and you dear colleagues -- should in any way have to share my own personal nightmare. So, I had to go."

Strauss-Kahn is currently holed up in the Empire Building at 71 Broadway, where management has apologized to residents and said that the new arrival will be gone by "early" this week.

His wealthy wife, French television journalist Anne Sinclair, had previously arranged a $15,000 a month apartment on the Upper East Side. But Strauss-Kahn was rejected after residents complained about the bad publicity.

Sinclair left the Broadway apartment for a few hours on Sunday on what was believed to be part of the new hunt for a home. She has suspended her blog about American life, "Two or three things seen from America."

"Dear reader, many, many many of you have sent me messages," Sinclair wrote. "I cannot answer everybody, but know that these touched me and helped me."

"You will understand the circumstances that have forced me to temporarily suspend this blog. All I can say is, a bientot."

While Strauss-Kahn gets used to bail life wearing an ankle bracelet and being forced to stay in an apartment under the watch of video surveillance and and armed guard around the clock, the legal battle is heightening even before his next court appearance on June 6 to make a formal plea.

His lawyer Benjamin Brafman has said Strauss-Kahn will plead not guilty and that he is confident his client will go free.

"He has impressed me very much. Despite the circumstances, he's doing well," Brafman told the Israeli newspaper Haaretz in an interview.

The defense team has hired a posse of private investigators who, according to media reports, are already sifting through the 32-year-old accuser's personal history in New York and her native Guinea in West Africa.

Prosecutors told Strauss-Kahn's bail hearing last week that they are also building a "strong" case in support of the accusations.

DNA tests taken from the Sofitel hotel where the attack allegedly took place are being studied. However no details have been made public. "We won't release any evidence before the trial," said Erin Duggan, a spokeswoman for the district attorney in New York.

Strauss-Kahn was arrested on an Air France flight just as it was about to leave New York's John F. Kennedy airport, a few hours after the alleged attack. He spent the first days in detention at the notorious Rikers island jail.

He now faces seven counts, including the attempted rape charge.

Ian Weinstein, a law professor at Fordham University in New York, said that if convicted at trial, "a sentence of 10 years in prison is entirely likely, and a sentence higher than that is entirely possible."

With additional reporting by Raw Story

[kenoma]

^ Likewise. The article you posted is a stale mishmash of poorly sourced and mainly irrelevant accusations, as DSK has only run the IMF since 2007, along with several outright lies -- where does DSK say "the poor have to bear any burden for a problem that the rich created?" -- in short, idiotic. But I was trying to let you know in a nice way.

Shrug away, you imbecile. You've accused (in a 'nice way') the author, Dave Cronin,of being a mockingbird, i.e. a CIA stooge. You're implicitly suggesting that CIA assets are running a smear campaign against the IMF, its methods and raison d'etre. That is the purest form of idiocy. The facts in the article are not poorly sourced. They do relate to DSK's tenure. There are not, as you claim 'several outright lies' in the article. You can't even name a single lie: the author never claimed that DSK said "the poor have to bear any burden for a problem that the rich created." Anyone who can read knows this. You say "several": what are the other lies told?

It is simply implausible to me that you believe yourself to be making sane, plausible, coherent arguments about this issue. I suspect you are simply trolling in a deliberately provocative defence of a sleazebag rapist oligarch with whom who have developed a strong psychological identification. Why that should be, I could not give the slightest fuck. But it is intensely irritating.